


when lightning strikes marble

by kindclaws



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/M, Fantasy and Monsters and Magic oh my!, Gen, The Two Princesses of Bamarre AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-08 00:39:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5476529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kindclaws/pseuds/kindclaws
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All the best stories in Bellamy's childhood began late into the night, by the orange glow of a dying candle as his mother finally put her sewing away and pulled him and Octavia close, her voice dropping to a dramatic whisper as she would say 'Once upon a time, in a beautiful kingdom just like our Arkadia...'</p><p>He never imagined he'd be living one of those legends, fraught with danger and magic, the prophesies of spectres, heartbroken dragons, and a certain blonde sorcereress with a knack for getting under his skin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	when lightning strikes marble

**Author's Note:**

  * For [letmebeyourstarrynight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/letmebeyourstarrynight/gifts).



> Happy holidays. :) It's not quite a "holiday" fic, but I'm hoping you'll still find it a worthy present. I'm sorry it's so long. Also, it gets happier at the end.

_No scales, no whipping tale,_  
_Only a shining face,_  
_Beacon in battle._  
_Only a man, the saviour,_  
_Tall among men,_  
_The warrior Lincoln._

  
All the best stories in Bellamy's childhood began late into the night, by the orange glow of a dying candle as his mother finally put her sewing away and pulled him and Octavia close, her voice dropping to a dramatic whisper as she would say _'Once upon a time, in a beautiful kingdom just like our Arkadia...'_

But Bellamy's story doesn't begin with a _once upon a time_. It begins with the Gray Death.

He's not there when Aurora collapses while fitting King Jaha for a new riding coat - he's in the castle courtyard, polishing Kane's armour in the weak winter sunlight and wondering what he has to do to get the man to name him his squire.

It's Octavia who runs out into the courtyard, cheeks flushed with exertion and eyes wild with an emotion he can't quite place until she catches her breath enough to speak.

"Bell," she says, voice catching. He reaches out to comfort her automatically, like he's done all his life. Her hand catches his before it reaches her shoulder and her fingernails dig into his skin almost hard enough to draw blood. "Bell. They're saying Mother has the Gray Death."  
  
"She can't," he replies immediately, because - because she _can't._  
  
But he follows Octavia back into the castle all the same, following the swish of her worn dress against cold stone in a daze. They've already moved Aurora to the infirmary, and it's the smell that knocks Bellamy back into reality - the cloying scent of herbs and incense that lets him know this isn't a bad dream. Their mother is awake and alert, sitting up in the furthest cot from the door, her sharp eyes immediately finding them as they enter the infirmary. She looks as she always has, a little tired, a little sly, but her hands are shaking where they rest above the blankets in her lap.

"Mother?" Bellamy asks softly. At their approach, the castle witch appears from behind some curtain, holding a pitcher of terrible-smelling tea. Abby Griffin. She always appears out of nowhere, and Bellamy doesn't know how to not be nervous around her.  
  
"She needs to rest. I'll send you out if you tire her," Abby says. She never speaks above a murmur, but her words are always heard.  
  
Bellamy's retort catches in his throat, and he simply nods once and turns his attention back to his mother. Octavia's already kicked off her shoddy slippers and climbed into the cot beside Aurora, tucking herself neatly underneath her mother's arm and resting her head against her collarbone. She looks very small there, so much less - less loud, less bold, less Octavia - than herself, and Bellamy sucks in a deep breath. His little sister is only twelve years old and about to be an orphan.

"Are you going to die now?" Octavia asks. Bellamy can't say anything.  
  
"Of course not," Aurora replies, far too brightly. She pulls Octavia closer with the arm slung around her shoulders and squeezes tightly. Her eyes meet Bellamy's over Octavia's dark head of hair. He sees the truth there and feels cold all over. "I feel absolutely fine. I think after a nice long nap-"  
  
"No!" Octavia shrieks. "No, you can't go to sleep!"  
  
"Not that kind of sleep," Bellamy says hastily, his sister's sharp fear finally breaking the paralysis he seemed to have fallen under. He sits on the very edge of the cot, in what room Octavia has left him, and embraces the two most important people in his life. "Not yet. Just a little nap, like you had when you were little, remember?"  
  
"You have to promise not to-" Octavia breaks off suddenly and hides her face in Aurora's hair. Their mother suddenly looks years older, stroking Octavia's head and gazing out the nearby window. Abby appears on the other side of the bed as though summoned by magic. Bellamy supposes that wouldn't be entirely impossible. She is a witch, after all. She's not magic the way her sorcerer husband is, but a different way that Bellamy understands even less.  
  
"I'm not going into the deep sleep for a long time, I promise," Aurora says, and Bellamy desperately wishes that were true, because once the deep sleep starts, it's all over. The Gray Death comes in three stages. The first creeps up like any illness or ordinary fatigue, only that it never goes away. Sometimes it lasts for months. Sometimes for days. Then deep sleep is the second stage. That lasts for exactly seven days. Then fever - exactly two days.

And then, without exception, it ends in death.

"I think that's enough excitement," Abby Griffin says, and Bellamy reluctantly pulls away, because you don't argue with a court witch. You just don't.  
  
Octavia's not so easily persuaded. He drags her away kicking and screaming. Aurora's eyes are shining with tears as the infirmary's heavy oak door closes behind them.

Bellamy carries his little sister to the quarters all three of them share, deep in the castle's belly near the kitchens where the hearth's warm seeps through stone even on the coldest of days, and he rocks her gently until her screams turn to racking sobs and finally to gentle, hiccuping tears. He brushes his fingers over her cheeks to dry them and pretends not to see her struggle to put her strong face back on.  
  
At long last she clambers out of his arms and paces around their quarters furiously, her little fists balled at her side and her eyebrows furrowed with thought. Bellamy watches with tired eyes and wonders if he'll be able to persuade his friend Miller - the Captain's son, though you wouldn't know it from his temperament - to take over some of his work duties while he rides out the tantrums that are sure to come in the next few days. They don't have a lot to pay him with - Aurora's work as the castle seamstress and Bellamy's as a stable hand provide them with little more than room and board - but he'll take on more work when... when he's able.

It hits Bellamy again that Aurora will be gone soon, and it will be just him and O. Gods, he doesn't know how he'll raise his sister alone. A few people in the castle die from the Gray Death every year but never... He never thought it'd hit so close to his heart.  
  
"I have an idea," Octavia announces after a few moments of pacing. Bellamy raises his head from his hands, eager for a distraction.

"What is it?" he asks, trying not to sound as exhausted as he is. To think this morning he was only worried about gaining Sir Kane's favour...  
  
"I'm going to tell Mother how to fight the Gray Death. If she fights, it can't kill her, right?" Octavia says, then looks at him expectantly. Bellamy forces himself to nod until she looks satisfied and resumes pacing. "Well. Right then. If I were sick would just get up and run around and jump until I wasn't tired anymore, and then I'd never fall into the deep slumber. The Gray Death couldn't get me if it tried. And it won't get Mother either, because I'll tell her how to fight it!"  
  
"We'll tell her together," Bellamy says, smiling wanly at Octavia's fierce face. "Tomorrow, when we go visit."  
  
Her face falls.

"We can't go tonight?"  
  
"Not unless we want to anger the witch," Bellamy whispers, and Octavia grins a little at that. Everyone in the castle is a little scared of the witch. He opens his arms wide. "Come here."  
  
Octavia bounds into his embrace and tucks her head neatly underneath his chin. He can wrap his arms around her and touch both elbows. Gods, she's too young.

"Bell?" she whispers after a moment.  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Mother will be one of the ones who lasts months and months, right?"  
  
He doesn't say anything.

Aurora slips into the second stage of the Gray Death just days later. Bellamy goes about his duties like a ghost for the seven days their mother spends in a restless, unbreakable slumber. The morning she wakes up, wan and shivering, Octavia cries for hours. Two days later, they have no more tears left.

A spectre once prophesied that a cure for the Gray Death would come when rain falls over all of Arkadia, and they know it must be so, because spectres must always tell the truth if caught. But Bellamy thinks to himself that they cry enough to flood Arkadia twice over, and it doesn't give Aurora a single extra hour to live.

 

  
_The dragon Costia exhaled a cloud_  
_Of vapours hot and thick,_  
_Bitter as bile._  
_Within the cloud,_  
_Lincoln, the saviour,_  
_Heard Costia's laugh._  
_He raised Banshee, and,_  
_Glowing white, the sword sang_  
_Away evil fumes, a narrow shaft_  
_To pure air_  
_And, unseen,_  
_To Costia._

 

  
Bellamy is twenty three years old when the castle sorcerer dies.

It's not a blow so much as it is a shock - sorcerers can easily live for five hundred years, after all, and Jake Griffin was not even four hundred. By all accounts, he should have outlived Bellamy, and Bellamy's children, and Bellamy's grandchildren too.

But even the longest of lifespans - second only to dragons, and the elf kingdoms to the east - can end in tragedy. The castle drapes itself in mourning black after news returns of Jake's honourable death trying to defend a nearby village from a flock of gryphons. There's some kind of vicious irony in being killed by the thing you were named for, but no one in the castle laughs. Bellamy didn't know him well - he's just a stable hand, after all, and a castle sorcerer is far too busy to make such acquaintances, but even so, he knows it'll be hard on the kingdom.

A few weeks later, his daughter returns from the academy.

There's to be a great banquet to welcome her home at last, after so many years that Bellamy's only memories of her are tinged with the hazy nostalgia of childhood. Sir Kane passes through the courtyard half a dozen times the morning that she's due to arrive, snapping at him and the other stable hands to clean the already spotless pavilion.

Octavia is finally released from her duties of last minute alterations to the gowns of noble ladies when the tip of a glorious blue banner appears over the crest of a nearby hill. She stands at Bellamy's side, bouncing with excitement, as the banner nears enough that they can discern the roaring gryphon on the billowing fabric, and the whole castle seems to hold its breath.

Sorcerers are something of a miracle. They're born so rarely that some ancient poet long ago likened their birth to the act of lightning striking a slab of marble, and the commonfolk ran with the metaphor and couldn't be persuaded to separate fact from legend. To this day a sorcerer's footsteps are followed by stares and intrigued whispers.

Some more than others.

Clarke Griffin is an anomaly among anomalies - as the child of a witch and a sorcerer, unheard of before in history, she is practically the only one of her kind. Bellamy thinks it must be lonely. In his lingering memory even the adults treated her with a sort of stilted, coolly polite respect, though she hardly looked older than sixteen.

In fact, she doesn't look at all changed from Bellamy's memory as she appears at the front of a column of riders bearing the same vivid blue as her gryphon banner. By the time her white horse is trotting over the drawbridge, Bellamy is already tracing the lines of her face, searching for any hint of the passage of time. He finds none.

"Come on, let's get closer," Octavia murmurs, wrapping her hand around his wrist. Before Bellamy can protest, she's already shouldering her way through the crowd that's formed in the courtyard to greet the half-sorcerer prodigy. Bellamy has no choice but to follow, murmuring apologies under his breath as Octavia drags them both to the front of the crowd. From their new vantage spot, they can see the profile of King Jaha and his son, Prince Wells, and the witch Abby Griffin standing at the King's right side, as always. Bellamy would have expected more joy in her face, seeing her daughter come home, but of the three forefigures of the welcome party, only the prince is smiling fondly as Clarke Griffin pulls her horse to a stop and dismounts in one fluid motion.  
  
Prince Wells steps forward almost immediately to embrace her, and Bellamy's a little surprised - the prince is about his age, and though Clarke was his constant companion when they were younger, she's been at the academy for years now, long enough that she's essentially a stranger to Octavia. Prince Wells can't remember her much more than Bellamy does.

But there's an obvious affection in their greeting nonetheless, and Bellamy thinks to himself that perhaps she wrote letters. Who is he to know the private business of the kingdom's most powerful people?

"I didn't expect her to be so young-looking," Octavia whispers, standing on her toes a little so she can whisper straight into his ear. "And so gorgeous!"

As though she's heard them, Clarke's head suddenly turns sharply to the side, and all the breath leaves Bellamy's lungs as his eyes meet hers across the courtyard. The moment must last only a few heartbeats, before she finally turns her attention back to King Jaha with what looks like a stiff smile. Bellamy feels like he's been drenched in the coldest storm, and his fingertips start trembling with a fluttering energy. _Lightning striking a marble slab_ , he remembers, and he'd laugh if there were any breath in his lungs.

"She was looking right at you!" Octavia whispers. "Close your mouth, you look like a fool. Gods, Bell, what's gotten into you?"  
  
Bellamy grunts in reply and turns away. Octavia makes a quiet sound of protest as he makes his way back through the crowd, heading for the stables for some peace and quiet, but she stays where she is, wanting to keep looking. He can't quite blame her.

Clarke Griffin's long-awaited arrival has drawn so many prestigious visitors from all over the kingdom that Bellamy's chosen to help serve at the feast. Mostly, this involves Sinclair, the head butler, pushing nicer robes at him and telling him to keep his head down and follow the direction of the servants who know what they're doing. Which is fine.

Until the guest of honour herself arrives at the ball, looking distant and a little uncomfortable in the traditional robes of a court sorcerer, and once again her eyes almost immediately fix on him, over the heads of a dozen important nobles clamouring for her introduction. Bellamy promptly spills a pitcher of wine on his front.  
  
Sinclair shakes his head in dismay as he appears in the kitchens, still dripping wine onto the stone beneath his feet.

"Could have been worse," Sinclair says at last, pointing him towards the baths. "You could have poured it on a countess."

 

  
_Costia's claws raked_  
_Her noxious golden hoard,_  
_Her whipping tail found instead_  
_Lincoln's scorched shoulder._  
_The dragon shrieked her triumph:_  
_"You're mine now. Mine!"_  
_She lifted Lincoln._  
_And on that upward journey_  
_To his doom,_  
_Lincoln swung Banshee_  
_And Costia's head tumbled off_  
_Still roaring with fury._

 

After that bizarre first day, Bellamy sees little of Clarke Griffin. Octavia, who's somehow managed to earn herself an apprenticeship with the witch, sees her nearly every day, and often relays tidbits of knowledge to Bellamy when they retire to their quarters at night.

He never really knows what to do with them. Octavia is too smart to be upfront about these things, knowing he'll run if she attacks straight-on, so instead he gives non-committal replies as she tells him how cool and down-to-earth Clarke is - both are unlikely, given the nature of sorcerers, and also the fact that Bellamy's seen her fly out of the courtyard a few times. Two things are clear - Clarke Griffin settles into Arkadia like she never even left, and Octavia has somehow convinced herself that Bellamy has a crush on her.

Which is _ridiculous_.

He's never even spoken to her. Not in the last several years, anyway. She probably still sees him as a muddy stable boy, still with lanky limbs and scabbed knees.

Ridiculous.

Clarke Griffin and Bellamy Blake operate in planes of existence that simply do not intersect. This remains true for nearly a year, until one night Bellamy and Octavia are in the kitchens late at night with other servants and labourers their age, taking advantage of a quiet night to have a little fun. Monty and Jasper, apprentices in the kitchen, have revealed a new batch of experimental liquor, and Miller's even taken out his lute and is strumming a tune that fills Bellamy up inside like warm honey. Miller draws the line at singing, of course, but even so some of the more energetic teenagers have taken up a complicated line dance.

Bellamy declines all the invitations that come his way and settles for watching Octavia, barefoot and bright-eyed, head thrown back with laughter and skirts hiked up nearly to her knees as she dances around a boy named Atom. Bellamy watches the boy's hands on his sister's waist carefully, waiting for them to inevitably creep lower so he can have an excuse to step in and shoo him off, but it never happens.

Instead, three songs in, Octavia stumbles.

It's nothing unusual. Octavia's blessed with a natural elegance to her limbs and a liveliness that lends itself even to the fastest of jigs, but it's been a long day and the kitchen floor is uneven where decades of feet have worn away clear paths.

Except that she stumbles another two times, catching herself on Atom's arms, until finally she falls and does not get back up again.

Miller stops playing abruptly, and as the music cuts off two or three couples keep dancing through their momentum, but most heads turn curiously towards the interruption. Bellamy is on his feet and halfway towards her before he makes any conscious decision, but Octavia stirs slowly, pushing herself up on one arm and then into a sitting position.

"O!" he calls, pushing Atom's concerned hold away and cradling her head in his own hands.  
  
"I'm fine, Bell," she replies, but her eyes are glazed over and her voice carries none of its usual depth, too high and breathy to calm the terror growing inside him.

"Someone get her some water," Bellamy commands loudly, unable to look away from Octavia's face.  
  
"Water's not going to help at this point," someone mutters sullenly from the back of the kitchens, and as soon as Octavia's able to sit up on her own Bellamy whirls on the direction the remark came from.  
  
"What did you say?"  
  
"Bellamy," Monty says, stepping forward to rest a hand on his arm unusually gently. He's got the same tone to his voice that Bellamy uses to calm skittering horses in the stables when the shrieks of migrating gryphons high up in the clouds send them into a frenzy. "Bellamy, I think you already know."  
  
"No," he replies, and then more forcefully. "No! Octavia's fine! She's a Blake. She's my sister, she has to be."  
  
"Bellamy..." Octavia starts, struggling to her feet. He turns, not fast enough to reach her. She makes it two steps before she collapses again, and then he carries her to the infirmary himself, his heartbeat pounding in his ears. Monty and Jasper, having been Octavia's friends as long as any of them can remember, take the lead with a candle to light the way. Miller follows close behind up the spiral staircases in case Bellamy loses his balance. None of them say anything over the sound of Octavia's ragged breathing.  
  
He doesn't understand. She was fine earlier this afternoon.  
  
They're in such a panic that no one hesitates before pounding on the heavy oak door to the infirmary, even though ordinarily all of them would have found excuses not to risk waking the witch. To their surprise, she opens it up almost immediately, her eyes already dark and alert. Abby Griffin's gaze passes over each of them in turn before settling on Octavia, and then it almost softens.

"Her brother is allowed inside. The rest of you should return to your quarters immediately," she says, still holding the door half closed.  
  
"But-" Jasper starts to protest. A single withering look from the witch make him immediately clam up, and so with last mournful looks at Octavia, they slink back down the darkened hall. Bellamy feels all the remaining warmth inside him leave with the candle they carry.  
  
"I'll see you tomorrow!" Octavia calls out weakly, and Monty turns back and waves before Miller pulls him along. Her smile fades. "I'll be better tomorrow," but she sounds like she's trying to convince herself more.  
  
"I expect you can keep a secret," Abby Griffin asks, turning her piercing gaze on Bellamy.  
  
"Anything for Octavia," he says, throat dry, and at last, she steps back and opens the infirmary door wide enough for him to step through, taking care not to hit Octavia's head on the doorframe.  
  
Inside he's surprised to see that there's already a cot occupied, though he has no idea who's in it because of the heavy curtains drawn around the bed. A flickering candle casts silhouettes on the curtain and an argument in low voices appears to ongoing, but Bellamy can't tell who it is, and he can't remember hearing of any other injuries or illnesses today through the castle rumour mill.

"Set her down here," Abby Griffin says distractedly, gesturing to a nearby cot, and to Bellamy's surprise she vanishes behind the curtains with the mysterious patient without a backwards look at the Blakes. He glares at the silhouettes for a moment, feeling terribly lost and helpless.

"Bell," Octavia whispers, and he immediately turns his attention back to her, leaning in close so that the smell of wildflowers tickles his nose. "I'm scared."

"You can't be," Bellamy replies automatically. He swallows to keep his throat from closing up. "Remember Mother's stories? Fear is a demon, like - "  
  
"Ogres and spectres and gryphons," Octavia finishes with a weak smile. "Yeah. And you have to slay the demon."  
  
"You're going to slay it," Bellamy says. "I believe in you. Remember that plan you had as a kid? If you ever got the Gray Death you were just going to keep running and jumping and dancing and then it couldn't get you. You were going to fight it and make it rue the day it ever decided to tangle with Octavia Blake."  
  
"I'm not going to do down easily," Octavia vows, and for a moment he sees that old, fierce light flicker back into her eyes, before the whispered argument being held behind the curtain reaches a crescendo as what sounds like a tray clatters to the floor.  
  
"I can't believe this," an icy voice says, and there's no mistaking the voice of Clarke Griffin. Chills creep down Bellamy's spine, and he and Octavia exchange bewildered glances. "You're cowards, every single one of you. You'd abandon your own _son_ to this?"  
  
"I know this may be a difficult concept for you to grasp, having inherited your father's immunity to illness, but we are only human, Clarke. This happens. And when it does, we accept it and we move on."  
  
Octavia catches on faster than Bellamy does.

"Was that the King?" she whispers to him, wide-eyed. In reply, he only nods, suddenly overwhelmingly aware that they are eavesdropping on a potentially dangerous conversation.

"I know this may be a difficult concept for _you_ ," Clarke replies, every word like a sharp dagger, "But I don't abandon my own. If you won't search for a cure, _I will_."  
  
And before Bellamy can think about what that means, the curtain whips aside and Clarke herself strides out like an avenging warrior on a battlefield, all purpose and power. She doesn't seem to notice the Blakes immediately, caught up in her own thoughts, but then her step falters, and she stops at the foot of Octavia's cot.  
  
"Octavia," Clarke says, her voice suddenly multitudes softer, and infinitely more weary. Bellamy didn't think sorcerers could get tired except after magic. "The Gray Death? I'm sorry."  
  
"She's not dead yet," Bellamy snaps, and freezes as Clarke's gaze turns on him instead. But she doesn't grow angry, or defensive. Instead, she merely looks thoughtful. After a moment she nods.

"That's right," Clarke replies. "There's hope for you yet, Octavia. Stay strong. If all goes well, I will see you soon. And if it doesn't... I suppose it won't matter for either of us, will it?"  
  
She's gone before either of them can think what to say, with that lightness of step that every sorcerer possesses. Bellamy simply holds his sister tighter as King Jaha strides past them without a sideways look, and they are left only with the sounds of Abby Griffin rooting through her herb supplies in the back, and laboured breathing from the cot behind the curtain.

By sunset tomorrow, everyone in the castle will know Prince Wells has fallen to the Gray Death. In another few days, the news will spread all over the kingdom. It'll be chaos, and somehow, Bellamy can't bring himself to care. His world is much smaller, and it's currently lying in his arms, slowly drifting off to sleep.

Suddenly struck by an energy so powerful and restless that it's almost too painful to bear, Bellamy extracts his arm from underneath Octavia's head and winces as she stirs.

"O," he says gently, cradling her cheek as her eyes blink up at him. "Promise me you'll be strong. You'll fight it. Slay the demon."  
  
"I promise," she says back, words slurred with exhaustion. He hopes it's not the deep slumber already. He kisses her forehead, lingers as long as he dares, knows these might be the last moments he has with her.  
  
"I'll be back as soon as I can," Bellamy says, and then he sprints out the door.  
  
Clarke Griffin's not in the court sorcerer's tower, though he finds the door to her chambers ajar and papers and magical artifacts strewn everywhere. The embers in her darkened fireplace are still smoldering, like she's just left. Bellamy curses under his breath and strides to the window. Far below, a figure with blonde waves and a billowing blue cape is crossing the courtyard, headed for the gatehouse.

Bellamy whirls around, taking in the mess she's left her tower in. Something glittering in the corner of his vision catches his attention, and he hesitates only a moment before lifting the elegant sword above the fireplace off its stand and pulling it out of its scabbard. The blade is sharp and well-oiled, clearly maintained. If he's going after Clarke, he'll need some way to defend himself. He attaches it to his belt and runs.

Bellamy makes it down the stairs in record time. Out in the courtyard, he yells at a bewildered guard about to lower the portcullis to wait just a moment, and saddles the two fastest horses in the stables - Prince Well's very own stallion Phoenix and Sir Kane's strider Alpha. His fingers shake with so much adrenaline that it takes several tries to do some of the trickier buckles, especially as the horses catch onto his nervous energy and start pawing at the hay under their feet.

"Easy there," Bellamy says, petting Phoenix's flank reassuringly. "We'll be out of here soon."

He mounts Alpha and is pleased to see that Sir Kane's measurements are close enough to his own that he won't have to stop to adjust the stirrups, and takes Phoenix's reins in hand as well. The bewildered guard stares at him as he comes out, and Bellamy doesn't give him enough time to think before nudging Alpha into a canter over the drawbridge.

In just a few minutes he spots the back of Clarke's head on the main road leading from the castle. He's not sure why she's not flying, but he's thankful for it anyway. He'd have no way to catch up if she took off.

"Hey!" he calls out, spurring Alpha faster at the sight of his goal. "Hey!"  
  
She makes no move to turn around or slow at all, continuing down the road at a furious pace. Bellamy clicks his tongue to slow Alpha as they draw up beside her, and finally has to pull the strider in Clarke's way to get her to even look at him.

"You can't make me go back," she says immediately, jutting her chin out, and Bellamy blinks in surprise.  
  
"Wouldn't dream of it," he replies. "You're a sorcerer. I have a lot to live for."  
  
"Good," Clarke says, neatly sidestepping him and continuing down the road again. "So go home."  
  
"Wait!" Bellamy calls, nudging Alpha after her. "Hold on! You're on a quest for a cure, aren't you? For the Gray Death?"  
  
"And if I was?" Clarke challenges.  
  
"Then I want to help," Bellamy says, and he forces himself not to look away from her eyes. In the moonlight she looks ethereal, but he is more terrified of Octavia dying than he is of her wrath, so he doesn't lower his gaze. "I can't sit and wait for my sister to die. Not while there's something I could be doing. I can hunt, and I'm not bad with a sword. And - I brought horses," he finishes lamely, gesturing towards Phoenix.

"You stole my sword," Clarke accuses him, her eyes landing on the gem-encrusted scabbard that rests at his hip.  
  
"Your fireplace wasn't going to use it any time soon," Bellamy retorts.  
  
"Be careful with it. Its name is Banshee, and it's worth more than either of us," Clarke responds primly.  
  
"Banshee?" Bellamy asks, despite himself. "You mean, the Banshee from the legends?"  
  
"You know your legends?" Clarke says instead of answering. She almost looks impressed. "Yes, that very one. In the hands of a true hero of Arkadia, it has the power to ward off any evil, no matter how great. Of course, there haven't been any true heroes since -"  
  
"Since the Gray Death fell over the land," Bellamy finishes quietly.  
  
For a moment, Clarke is very silent, and very still.  
  
"It will be a dangerous journey," she says, voice almost soft. "With no guarantee of success. You could be throwing away the last days you have with your sister."  
  
"I could also be saving her life."  
  
"If put in a situation where I have to choose between obtaining the cure or rescuing you from mortal peril, I will choose the cure," Clarke says, and that sounds like a test.  
  
"Likewise," Bellamy responds, and he swears she almost smiles.  
  
"Well," she says breezily. "I shan't pass up the company, or I'd have to call myself a fool."  
  
With that, she simply floats up off the ground and settles in Phoenix's saddle like she's always belonged there. Bellamy reaches over to pass the reins to her, and most ladies of high standing wear gloves, to show themselves above manual labour, but for some reason she's not, and he sucks in a deep breath as his fingertips brush against bare skin. Her hands are beyond warm, they _radiate_ heat.

She spares him a single curious glance before nudging her stallion into a walk, and he swallows down the dryness in his mouth to follow.

"Where are we going?"  
  
Clarke stares straight ahead as she answers, to the darkness in which they are venturing forth.

"Legends say the fairies once knew of a cure," she says.  
  
"No one's seen a fairy in centuries," Bellamy says. "Their mountain, if it even exists outside of legend, is invisible."  
  
"It exists," Clarke says grimly. "And they say a spectre or a dragon could lead us to it. I'd rather not fancy my chances with a dragon, so we're headed to Trigeda Forest to catch a spectre."  
  
"Spectres or dragons, huh," Bellamy mutters. "The legends couldn't have chosen something a little less menacing?"  
  
"If it were easy, we would have had a cure long ago," Clarke replies, her eyes sad and old beyond the years she appears to be. Bellamy says nothing more, and they ride in silence until the breaking dawn above the menacing treeline of Trigeda Forest turns the sky soft pinks and purples, and eventually, the blue of Clarke's eyes.

He watches for clouds, for a hint of the rain that was prophesied to cleanse Arkadia of the Gray Death, but the sky remains brilliantly, painfully clear.

 

  
_"Arkadia will see no more of me_  
_Until the timid_  
_Go forth with the strong._  
_But while her heroes_  
_Still fight alone,_  
_Arkadia will see no more of me."_  
_Lincoln went then_  
_Into the mists beyond TonDC,_  
_And he was no more_  
_Seen in Arkadia._

 

  
Bellamy's stomach is growling by mid-morning. They've only just reached the sprawling edges of Trigeda Forest, and he's wondering where they'll find enough supplies to feed themselves. He didn't have time to bring much more than the sword Banshee and the clothes on his back when he ran out after Clarke, and somehow he doesn't think she packed very much either.

They stopped passing villages hours ago, since no sane person wants to live anywhere near Trigeda Forest and the dangers within its dark underbrush, and if worst comes to worst Bellamy could set snares and hope they catch something, but it's far more likely that they themselves will fall into the trap of some other, bigger predator.

At last he brings up the courage to mention it to Clarke.

"Are you ever going to get hungry?" he asks. She seems a little startled.  
  
"Oh!" she cries. "Oh, goodness! I'm so sorry, Bellamy. I forgot that humans need to eat!"  
  
She immediately pulls Phoenix to a halt and dismounts, patting the stallion's neck and murmuring a few reasuring words before turning her attention to the pack slung across her back. Bellamy follows her lead a little warily, wondering if she's about to conjure food with magic. Sorcerers can do that, can't they?

But to his immense confusion, Clarke only pulls out a tiny square of fabric, dark blue in colour and shimmering slightly, but otherwise completely innocuous.

"Ta da!"

"Clarke..." Bellamy says, eyeing the tiny square. "That's hardly a handkerchief."

"Watch and learn," Clarke proclaims, and throws the square up into the air. "Kind tablecloth, please set thyself!"

To Bellamy's utter shock, the square begins to grow in midair as though unfolding invisible layers of fabric, before falling and hovering on a perfect horizontal plane at the height of his hip. As he reaches out to touch it in amazement, finding it solid and steady under his fingers as though a real table lies beneath, delicate porcelain plates and silver cutlery appear out of thin air and lay two spots at the table with the neatest precision. More plates appear in between the two spots, laden with the richest food Bellamy's ever seen in his life - creamy soups with steam still rising off their surface, a roast bird on a bed of vividly coloured vegetables, pies of every flavour imaginable - and that's just the start.

"What do you think?"

"It's amazing," Bellamy breathes out. He glances up at Clarke, and sees her looking awfully pleased with herself as she curtsies. " _You're amazing_."

"Please, dig in."

"Are there chairs?" Bellamy asks, looking around as though the magical tablecloth might have provided them with furniture as well. Instead, Clarke flushes.

"Well, you see, I'm still working on the enchantment, it was my thesis project at the academy, actually, but I haven't had a lot of time to work on it since I came to court, and -"

"It's amazing," Bellamy repeats. "We'll stand. In the kitchens we're too busy to sit down to eat most days, anyway."

Clarke falls suddenly silent, and Bellamy almost wishes he hadn't brought up the huge difference in their classes, but he quickly forgets his shame in the most wonderful meal he's had in his whole life. Clarke watches him pensively as he tries a little bit of everything, though she only eats a bowl of porridge with jam stirred in.

"What's it like, being a sorcerer?" he asks, trying to imagine outliving everyone around him and never needing to eat or drink or sleep, sustained only by a mythical flame.

"What's it like, being human?" she retorts, and he doesn't have an answer for that, so he finishes off his slice of apple pie and when he's done, Clarke clears her throat and announces. "Kind tablecloth, I thank thee for the fine meal."

At once the rich dishes vanish in on themselves, and the tablecloth rises high into the air, spinning rapidly against a bright blue sky, until it folds once again and falls into Clarke's outstretched palm. And then there's no longer any excuse to delay venturing into the forest, so they go.

Trigeda Forest is shrouded in shadow and secrets. There are no kindly denziens within, no paths that go through to lead travellers to safety, no guarantee, at all, that they are not marching into certain death. As the underbrush starts to thicken, the horses grow so nervous that they both dismount and pull them along by the reins. Clarke casts a calming charm to alleviate their nerves, but they still snort at the slightest distant noise and paw nervously at the ground.

"How deep do you think we'll have to go to catch a spectre?" Bellamy asks, trying for a casual tone. As a child, he told Aurora that he didn't think spectres were particularly scary, at least compared to all the other dangerous creatures in Arkadia, and she sternly warned him that spectres are, perhaps, the most dangerous of all, because they take the face of the people you love and you never even know you're in danger until the moment you're already in their trap.

"I don't know," Clarke admits, her brow furrowed with thought. "All the guides give only tips on how to _avoid_ them, not how to _find_ them."

Bellamy thinks it might be because there are two of them - it's always harder for a spectre to trick two people at once than just one unsuspecting traveller - but he doesn't dare suggest splitting up. Trigeda Forest is cursed with a dark mist so thick and damp that it's hard to see anything clearly more than fifty paces away. If separated, he and Clarke could wander in circles around each other for all the days that Octavia and Princes Wells have left to live, and they would never know. No, better not to split up. They'll just have to go deeper into the forest until the spectres simply can't resist.

"There's something up ahead," Clarke says suddenly, drawing his attention. Her calming charm must have started wearing off because the horses have grown even wilder, and as Bellamy goes to pat Alpha's neck, he can see the bright whites of the strider's eyes. _Sorry, boy_ , he thinks apologetically.

"What can you see?" Bellamy asks, squinting through the underbrush that Clarke is already pushing aside to get through. He leads Alpha around a particularly thick and thorny bush instead of trying to follow her, and when they reunite on the other side, Clarke's already scraped moss off a long-forgotten white stone.

"Marble," she announces, laying her palm against it. "And... powerful, somehow. I don't understand."

She turns on him suddenly, reaching a hand out to touch the worn travel cloak wrapped around his shoulders. Bellamy freezes under her touch, watching and waiting. Clarke's face is thoughtful. A moment later she taps her finger on the wool at his shoulder and steps back. Alpha starts to toss his head so violently that Bellamy has to grab the reins with both hands to keep him in place.

"I think that's the best glamour I've ever done," Clarke says cheerfully. "It should hold against pretty much anything that's not a spectre or a dragon. Except that now even _I_ can't see you. Where are you?"

"Right here," Bellamy responds, confused, as Clarke starts to reach her hands out and walk forward as though blind in the dark. Her hands brush against his chest and - is that a blush on her cheeks? Hard to tell with the gloomy light that trickles through Trigeda's treetops.

"You're invisible, now," she tells him, her hand finding his shoulder once more and patting down along his arm until she reaches his hand. "Hold on, or else I'll lose you."

"Oh," Bellamy says dumbly as her fingers curl around his.

"Come along!"

Up ahead, the forest seems to ease up ever so slightly, and Bellamy sucks deep breaths into his lungs as a heavy weight he didn't realize was resting on his chest lifts. It even seems brighter, though it's hard to say if the canopy has thinned or if it's the light reflecting off the white marble slabs that dot the surrounding woods. Bellamy's curiosity grows as what looks like a stone wall appears through the gloom. The horses strain at their reins and dig their hooves into the dirt, but their stubbornness is no match for Clarke, who passes Phoenix's reins to Bellamy and floats off the rotting leaves under their feet to examine the wall more closely.

Bellamy watches attentively as she perches on top of the wall and looks over. Alpha snorts and tosses his head violently again.

"Bellamy," Clarke says, her voice sounding odd. "I think this is a labyrinth!"

"That doesn't bode well for a quest with a time limit," he warns her, and she looks pensive once again.

"That's true, but - if we're to catch a spectre, I'm sure it'll be here. I can feel the magic here! Though... It's a little strange..."

"What's strange?"

"It feels ancient. Spectres are a relatively young species, you see. But they are so fond of hiding places that I'm sure one must be around here somewhere."

She keeps talking about spectre hunting habits, which is probably important, but Bellamy doesn't hear anymore. His mind drifts suddenly to yet another one of the stories that Aurora told him and Octavia when they were little, and suddenly it is very important that they get far, far away from the labyrinth.

"Clarke," Bellamy says quickly. "Clarke, I don't think it's spectres you're sensing. My mother told us stories of labyrinths when we were little, and at their center they always had a -"

His words are interrupted by a roar that shakes the very ground underneath Bellamy's feet and freezes the blood inside his veins. He barely feels it as Alpha and Phoenix tear their reins out of his hands and bolt in the opposite direction, the thundering of their hooves muffled by rotting leaves. The roar comes again, closer, and with it, what sounds like a drumbeat of an entire marching army - before Bellamy realizes it's just the hooves of a very large, very angry creature. They've woken the minotaur.

"Bellamy, run!" Clarke cries out, leaping up off the wall to float just underneath the tree canopy. Bellamy has a glimpse of her hands glowing bright and sparking with tiny thunderclouds, and of a great horned head appearing from within the labyrinth, with two crazed red eyes and a snout that blows out clouds of steam, before he turns and runs. Panic drives out all thoughts other than _ClarkeClarkeClarke_ and _we'regoingtodie_ and _Octaviaisgoingtodie._

He runs until he cannot draw a single, gasping breath into his lungs, and then he falls to his knees in the middle of Arkadia's most dangerous forest, and recognizes nothing around him.

 _Oh_ , he thinks. _Oh no._

 

 _Now, when the spectre haunts,_  
_Or the dragon flames,_  
_Or the ogre attacks,_  
_Or gryphons descend,_  
_Arkadia fights alone._  
_Lincoln, the saviour,_  
_Tall amoung men,_  
_Is gone._

 

  
After what seems like hours wandering around Trigeda Forest, too afraid to call out in case he draws the manticore to him, Bellamy finally hears his name, faintly, in the distance.

He throws all caution to the wind and starts yelling.

"Clarke! Clarke, where are you? Are you all right?"

They bellow back and forth, replies slowly growing louder and clearer, until Clarke finally emerges from the underbrush. There's a gash above her eyebrow that's bleeding ever so slightly, and she looks utterly exhausted, but he's never been happier to see her face.

"There you are!" she says, collapsing on a log a few steps away from him. When he starts towards her, she raises a palm and adds, "I'm not hurt, I just need to rest a few moments. Are you all in one piece?"

"Thanks to you," he says, and gingerly sits down on the same log, leaving her the breathing space she seems to need even though he'd really like to hold her hand again. Just - to make sure she's not cold or anything. _Sorcerers have their flame to keep them warm_ , his treacherous brain reminds him. _Shut up_ , he replies.

"Well, that was an adventure!" she says brightly. "Are you ready to set off? I got a pretty good view of the forest while I was flying about trying to shake the manticore, and I saw some tunnels not far from here that we should explore."

"You're the expert," Bellamy says with a shrug, and they stand and venture off once more. "I hope we don't find any nasty surprises in these tunnels, too."

She laughs at that, and Bellamy thinks it might be the first time he's ever heard her laugh. He likes it. He wants to hear more of it. They keep talking as they walk, more than before, and Bellamy listens as she tells him of the academy, her hands gesturing in the air in front of her, her eyes bright with enthusiasm. If he'd known all it would take was a manticore attack to bond them, he might have wandered into Trigeda Forest sooner.

"We've nearly reached the tunnels," she says, ducking under a stray branch, just as Bellamy hears something faint in the distance.

"Just a second," he says, turning back to listen. It sounded... Oddly, it sounded like his name.

"Come _on_ , Bellamy," Clarke says, impatient, tapping her foot against the ground. The motion draws his attention to her boots, and he realizes two things very suddenly.

The first, that he's still wearing the cloak Clarke enchanted, the one that leaves him invisible even to her - but not to a spectre. The second, that Clarke isn't leaving any footprints in the mud, and - and she didn't let him touch her earlier.

"Clarke!" Bellamy yells as loud as he can, whipping off his cloak. The not-Clarke standing in front of him twists her face into an ugly grimace, and then her face just keeps twisting, her teeth sharpening into vicious points and her edges smoking. Through her eyes, Bellamy can suddenly see the forest behind her. "Clarke!"

"Bellamy!" the distance voice answers, louder and closer. Gods, he hopes she makes it in time. But the spectre is already starting to fade, knowing its trick has been discovered. Bellamy hesitates for just a moment, as not-Clarke's edges blur into thin air, and then he runs forward and launches himself at it. It feels just like hugging a column of freezing cold water might feel, but somehow it's substantial enough that Bellamy knocks it to the ground and pins it down. He draws Banshee from his hip and holds the tip just above not-Clarke's chest, because it makes him feel safer, though he doesn't think it would have much effect.

"I caught you in your lie, spectre, and now you have to answer a question for me!"

"Very well, Bellamy Blake," not-Clarke all but purrs, and it's still using her voice. Gods, why is it still using her voice? Why curse Bellamy with this now, of all times and places? "Ask your question."

"What is the cure to the Gray Death, and where can I find it?"

"That's two questions!" the spectre says, shaking a finger mockingly at him. "I'll tell you this much - you would have better luck asking a dragon."

Clarke lands on the forest floor just as not-Clarke vanishes underneath Bellamy, and he staggers to his feet away from the spot, still holding Banshee weakly in one hand.

"Bellamy! Are you all right?"

The spectre asked him the same question. In two steps he's reached her, Banshee held up in one hand, the other grasping for her hand. When he finds it, it's warm and solid beneath his calluses, and Bellamy feels his relief like a warm wind on a cold day. He drops Banshee and pulls Clarke - the real Clarke - into his arms. Her own arms wrap around his waist and press against his back, providing heat and comfort. For a moment neither of them say anything, then at last he pulls away and gesture lamely at the spot where not-Clarke vanished.

"I followed it for _ages_ ," he admits. "It was going to take me to some tunnels, and I just - I believed it. Didn't even get a good answer out of it."

"Spectres can fool even the wisest and most prepared of minds," Clarke tells him sagely. "But it's a rare person who can see past the trick and win a question."

"I wouldn't have figured it out if I hadn't heard you calling," Bellamy argues. "Though I should have. It saw straight through the cloak."

"You did well, Bellamy," Clarke insists, and all the protests in his throat fall silent as she reaches out and lays a hand on his shoulder. "Now, I heard something about a dragon?"

Bellamy sighs heavily.

"You heard right," he says grimly. "We have to find ourselves a dragon, and we don't even have horses anymore. They ran off when the manticore charged."

"Do you think they'll be able to find their way back to the castle all right?" she asks, forehead creased in worry.

"They're smart," Bellamy says assuredly. "I'm more worried about us."

"We'll be okay," Clarke says, her hand dropping to his own and squeezing. She smiles faintly and then asks, "I think it's time for a little sun, don't you? How would you feel about flying with me?"

 

  
_But the tale has not_  
_Run out- not yet._  
_So be brave, Arkadia!_  
_Go forth, Arkadia,_  
_The timid with the strong._  
_Let not your heroes_  
_Fight alone._

 

  
Flying is... interesting, for lack of a better word. Mostly Bellamy clings to Clarke's robs and tries not to vomit when he looks down. She's thoroughly entertained for the entire trip until they finally land on a grassy hill, far from the dark and damp of Trigeda Forest. Bellamy stumbles off and counts to ten repeatedly to calm the nausea swirling in his stomach while Clarke throws her magical tablecloth up into the air and politely asks it to set itself.

He doesn't think he'd be able to eat just yet, but as soon as the tablecloth starts lading itself with all of his favourite foods, Bellamy's appetite miraculously returns. He and Clarke make a picnic of it, sitting on the grass below the tablecloth and reaching up for new plates as they empty old ones. Clarke's pack is full of maps that she spreads between them and weighs down with tiny pebbles so the wind doesn't take them away.

There are three dragon lairs within Arkadia's borders - the ancient Indra to the far West, the cunning Anya to the far East, and the young and mysterious Lexa, not far South from where they are. Bellamy drags his finger along the distance they've already covered in a day and a half and shakes his head in amazement.

"I've never been this far away from the castle before," he admits.

"Really?" Clarke asks, raising an eyebrow. "I'm honoured to share in your first journey, then. How are you finding it?"

Bellamy thinks for a moment before sheepishly saying,

"Exhausting."

He thinks of Octavia, waiting to die in the infirmary. He wonders if she's fighting like she promised, like she planned all those years ago. Will running and jumping and refusing to sleep help her at all? Will it buy him more time to find a cure for her? Or will it only weaken her further?

"Sleep," Clarke says.

"I can't," Bellamy says. "Come on, we've wasted enough time already. Octavia or Wells could slip into the deep sleep any day now, and after that happens, we'll only have nine days left to find a cure. We need to go."

"You'll be utterly useless without rest," Clarke chides. "At least nap an hour or two. I promise I'll wake you."

He suspects she uses magic to persuade him, because the next thing Bellamy knows, his head is in her lap and he's so warm and comfortable, and the breeze brings along with it the scent of the same wildflowers that Octavia likes to braid into her hair, and Clarke is singing him a lullaby. Bellamy blinks, and then he sleeps.

When he wakes again, what feels like hours later, it's to Clarke shaking him roughly. His eyes open and at first she occupies his entire world view, her panicked face inches from his, blonde hair having tumbled off her shoulders and hanging down on either side. Behind her head the sun is blazing bright, and silhouetted against a stark sky are - _gryphons_!

"We have to run!" she says quickly, hauling him to his feet. Bellamy stumbles as she pulls him with considerable force down the hill, but catches his rhythm after a few dizzying steps. There's a copse of trees up ahead that Clarke seems to be aiming for, but it's too far. They'll never reach it in time, not if the shrieks and caws of the gryphons diving down from the sky are anything to go by. Bellamy instinctively pats his hip for Banshee's scabbard, before realizing that he unbuckled it when he went to rest and it's still up on the hill next to their packs and the tablecloth.  
  
They're so close to the trees that Bellamy's just dared to start hoping they'll live before a gryphon breaks off from the rest of the flock and lands, snarling, between them and the meagre shelter the copse would have provided.

"Bellamy, where's Banshee?" Clarke pants, throwing herself between him and the gryphon, that's now gouging its wicked claws into the dirt and slowly approaching.  
  
"Left behind," he answers. "Aren't you magic?"  
  
"I'm almost drained," Clarke answers, but she gathers a ball of lightning in her hands all the same and throws it straight at the gryphon's face, blinding it. Bellamy knows, even as they dart past the screeching monster, that it's only brought them a few minutes to come up with a plan. There's just too many gryphons.  
  
"What happened?" he asks as they reach the copse and Clarke immediately grabs him and flies them up into the densest branches she can find. They peer out at their abandoned picnic with dismay, counting twelve gryphons tearing into the feast the magical tablecloth provides. As soon as they finish one dish, another is conjured. Gryphons are legendary for their stomachs, and the lengths they will go to to fill them. Every year, the castle receives more reports of flocks carrying off entire herds of grazing sheep.  
  
"I was working on the enchantment on the tablecloth," Clarke replies miserably. "To add chairs, like you suggested. I'll have to rest before my magic recovers. I never imagined the smell of food would attract gryphons!"  
  
"Guess you didn't have to imagine very much at your fancy academy," Bellamy mutters. "Gryphons don't ever stop eating. As soon as they're bored with your magic tablecloth, they'll come and eat us, and all of Octavia and Wells' hopes for a cure will go up in smoke!"

"I am doing the best I can!"

"Well it's not good enough."

"Bellamy!" Clarke says sharply. "Look!"  
  
He doesn't realize what she means at first, gazing over at a scene that looks like it came straight out of a legendary battle. The grassy hill they set their picnic on, once so peaceful and picturesque, is now covered in food scraps from the magical tablecloth and tufts of fur as the gryphons turn on each other trying to get more food than the others. Several already lie dead on the grass surrounding the overflowing table, while others seem to just... stumble away and collapse.

Slowly, every single gryphon dies, either at the hands of its more greedy kin or having gorged itself to death. And in the midst of it all, Clarke's magical tablecloth continues to conjure new dishes.

They climb down from the tree and stumble back to their camp, stepping over outstretched wings and limp lion limbs. Bellamy doesn't feel safe until he has Banshee buckled back at his hip, his hand resting on the silver hilt.

"Kind tablecloth, I thank thee for the fine meal," Clarke murmurs, and the tablecloth folds itself up and drops into her palm. Bellamy pretends not to notice that her hand is shaking ever so slightly.  
  
"I'm sorry for yelling at you earlier," he murmurs. Her answering smile is wan, and doesn't quite meet her eyes. He suddenly remembers that Jake Griffin died at the beaks and claws of a flock of gryphons, and feels worse.  
  
"No use crying over spilled milk, right?" she says, voice falsely bright as she stuffs all their strewn belongings back into their packs. "Anyway, we should talk about where we're going from here. I was thinking - "

Bellamy never gets a chance to hear what Clarke was thinking, because just then she is interrupted by the _whoosh_ of giant wings beating down up on them, the air current so powerful that they're both immediately knocked to the ground. Before Bellamy can get back to his feet, some great weight rests itself on his back, pushing his face into the grass. Just when he thinks he'll be utterly flattened, the weight lifts and he feels something wrap around his torso - _claws._

A giant clawed foot picks him up as though he weighs nothing and Bellamy finds himself held up in front of a great, blinking green eye.

"I thought I smelled gryphon," Lexa says, and if dragons could smile, he thinks she would be. "I expected to find some poor village eaten out of house and home, but this is a more interesting twist, I think. You'll have to tell me the story over dinner."

 _Are we the dinner?_ Bellamy dares to ask himself, but Lexa says no more before snapping up two gryphons with her mouth and swallowing them whole. In her other foot, Clarke looks at him desperately. The weakest of lightning balls flickers between her hands, but he knows she won't regain her magic fast enough.  
  
"Do try to keep your meals in your stomachs," Lexa tells them, licking her teeth. "I hate cleaning vomit off my claws."  
  
And with that, she takes off, Clarke and Bellamy helplessly dangling beneath her.

 

  
_Then one day,_  
_In the spring of the year_  
_When monsters are hunting,_  
_Lincoln, hero of Arkadia,_  
_We will meet again._

 

  
If Bellamy thought flying with Clarke was awful, it's nothing compared to flying in the grip of a dragon's claws. Despite Lexa's warning, he vomits everything he ate from the magical tablecloth and spends the rest of the journey shivering in the freezing winds that buffet him and wishing there were some way he could unpin his arm from within Lexa's iron grip and unsheathe Banshee.

But even if he did - they're leagues away from the ground, and Clarke looks so miserable that Bellamy just _knows_ her magic hasn't returned yet. She is, after all, only a very young sorcerer, even if she's four times as old as he is.

Bellamy can't quite bring himself to be glad when Lexa draws closer to ground, her claws nearly skimming mountaintops, because if she's landing - their lives are about to come to a very fiery end. No one's ever returned from a dragon's lair. Well, no one but a hero of legend.

Lexa's lair is a cave set deep in a mountain range. Bellamy doesn't have to look to know there won't be an easy path down the jagged rocks - which wouldn't ordinarily be a problem, since Clarke could fly them out if she weren't feeling drained - but he doesn't think Lexa has any intention of letting them go any time soon. She lands bird-like, pulling up the feet that hold Bellamy and Clarke up to her broad, scaled chest, and beating the air with quick, powerful strokes to brake. The earth still shakes when at last her weight settles on the rock, and Bellamy and Clarke are promptly tossed into a pile of gold coins that knocks all the air out of their lungs.

"I hope you spent the journey thinking about how you will entertain me," Lexa says, pacing in the entrance to the cave once, twice, three times, before settling into the gap like one of the castle cats curling up after a satisfying meal. But her eyes remain alert and mesmerizing as Bellamy stumbles to his feet and reaches for Banshee. "Oh, don't pull out the sword, then I will have to kill you. You can do much better than that."

"You'll kill us anyway," Bellamy pants, though he rests his hand on Banshee's hilt and doesn't make a move to unsheathe it yet. It could be useful. There's a part of the legends of Lincoln where he's captured by a dragon and he manages to defeat her by hiding within her treasure until the right moment to leap out and cut off her head - the legends probably exaggerated, but Bellamy isn't ready to give up just yet.  
  
"Well, yes," Lexa admits. "But I will probably feel bad about it afterwards. I often grow fond of my guests. I miss most of them after I eat them."  
  
"That makes me feel a lot better," Clarke mutters, rubbing at her forehead with her hand. Lexa's scaled head swivels dramatically towards her, and there's a calculating look in her cat-like green eyes that unnerves Bellamy.  
  
"You should work on making me feel better," Lexa says, extending one wing to poke at Clarke just like Bellamy's seen the castle cats toy with captured mice. She must misjudge the amount of force required, because the wingtip bowls Clarke over just as she manages to stand up, sending her back into the nearest pile of treasure. "I am your host, and I want to be entertained. Neither of you have proven very interesting so far, and if that doesn't change soon I will just eat you right now. Can you dance, or sing?"  
  
"I can tell stories," Bellamy says suddenly.  
  
"I have heard every story there is to tell," Lexa responds dismissively, turning her bright gaze on him. "I have lived much longer than you have, and listened to many more bards. One of them left me that lovely hat, over there."  
  
Bellamy turns and sees what must have once been a beautiful hat covered in iridescent peacock feathers balanced on the top of a wonderfully carved wardrobe, but has now started to disintegrate with age. He swallows hard and looks back at Lexa.

"You haven't heard our story yet," he challenges. Lexa seems to consider this for a moment, picking at her claws - Bellamy suspects it's mostly to show off her teeth to them - before nodding.  
  
"You're right. I haven't. Make it a good one, please, or I will set you on fire. Like this," she says, and promptly blows a stream of flame at a nearby pile of gem-encrusted goblets. There isn't much in the pile for her fire to burn, but a wave of blistering heat still rolls over Bellamy, making it hard to breathe for a moment.  
  
"Is this cave properly ventilated?" Clarke asks suddenly. Bellamy catches on instantly - if there's another opening, they might be able to escape through it.  
  
"Of course it is," Lexa responds, offended. "Do you think I'm a novice? Now hurry up and tell your story."  
  
With Lexa's watchful eye on them, they don't seem to have any other option. So they settle in, Clarke's knee resting against Bellamy's thigh as the barest of comforts, and they tell their tale with as much detail and flare as they dare. Bellamy chokes up as he speaks of Octavia falling down in the middle of her dancing, and Clarke takes his hand quickly and covers up his slip with her own description of realizing Wells was sick halfway through their evening chess game. Lexa is unimpressed with their run-in with the minotaur, lazily flicking her tail and saying she's seen much bigger monsters, but she crows with delight during Bellamy's fight with not-Clarke. When he reveals that the spectre told them to seek a dragon, she grows pensive, and does not speak again until Clarke mentions eating from their magical tablecloth. She demands a demonstration, and watches with rapt attention as the tablecloth begins to conjure all manners of roast meat.  
  
"I wondered why you stink of magic," Lexa comments, and Bellamy holds his breath until she says she has grown bored with the tablecloth and allows Clarke to put it away. As long as Lexa believes it's the tablecloth's magic that she can smell on Clarke and not her sorcerer's flame, they might still have a fighting chance to get away. "Now, you were at the part where you stopped for lunch on the hill?"

Lexa is utterly delighted when they tell her how the gryphons ate themselves to death. If you've never heard a dragon laugh before, it sounds a little like a thunderstorm. Her amusement fades, however, as they finish the story.

"Is there no more?" she demands. "I hate an unfinished story. I cannot stand them."  
  
"The story's not over yet," Clarke says, sounding diplomatic. "But if you tell us how to find a cure for the Gray Death and let us continue on our quest, I promise we'll come back at the end and finish it."  
  
"Cute," Lexa says, snorting twin wisps of smoke out of her snout. "But I'm no hatchling, Clarke of Arkadia. You can't fool me. You are staying in this cave until I grow bored of your company, and then I will eat you and you will be no more. It's a shame, but I am a dragon and this is how the world works. Now, I am going to go hunting again, and when I'm back, I hope you have thought of a new way to entertain me."  
  
With that, Lexa uncurls herself from the entrance of the cave and slinks out with a final lash of her long, spiked tail. Bellamy inches closer to Clarke, hoping she has an escape plan at the ready, but before they can move, Lexa rolls a huge boulder into the entrance and they are left trapped. There are gaps all around the boulder where it does not quite meet the cave walls and light shines through, but they are not nearly big enough for them to slip through. Bellamy spends several minutes pushing and kicking at the makeshift door before he turns to Clarke -

\- Only to find empty space where she was sitting before.

"Up here," Clarke says, and he glances up to find that she's floating near the cave's high ceiling, poking through a row of ornate chests on a ridge of stone that no human would be able to reach.  
  
"Forget treasure," Bellamy says, though before he might have ached at the sight of enough gold to buy a plot of land and build Octavia a house of her own - now, he only cares about making sure she'll live that long. "Come down here and help me move this rock."  
  
"There's no use," Clarke says absently, still picking items up and turning them this way and that. "Think, Bellamy. Your spectre told us to find a dragon, and then a dragon found us. Lexa could know about the cure. Why would we leave as long as we still don't know about it?"

"We're at a disadvantage here," he argues. "We need to make a plan."  
  
"We're not at the disadvantage. She only thinks we are. So I say we play along. Entertain the dragon, Bellamy. Oh, what's this?"  
  
He throws his hands up in the air in exasperation as Clarke pulls out a dented bronze spyglass and holds it up to her eye. She gasps, and he wonders what's possibly interesting about a close-up of the cave wall. Lexa's lair is magnificent, of course, huge caverns full of glittering golden treasure and trophies from her past guests - like the peacock feathered hat - but he can't bring himself to muster any curiosity about the history that must be contained within her collection.

"Bellamy!" Clarke cries out, and flies back down to his level, holding out the spyglass eagerly. "Look!"

He humours her, raising it to his eye and letting her point him in a direction, and feels a pang go through him when he sees... Octavia.

"I don't understand," he murmurs, but it's really her. She's in the castle infirmary, dressed in a ratty nightgown Monty and Jasper must have fetched from their quarters for her, and Prince Wells is next to her. They are walking slow, grueling laps up and down the aisle of the infirmary under Abby Griffin's disapproving eye. Octavia's cheeks are flushed with exertion and Prince Wells moves with all the strength of an old man in his last days, but Octavia's kept her promise. She's fighting back the Gray Death with everything she has.  
  
"They haven't gone into the deep sleep yet," Bellamy says to Clarke, reluctantly passing the magic spyglass back to Clarke so she can look at her friends too. She is silent as she raises it to her eyes, and the relieved smile on her lips fades.

"It won't be long now," she says. "Tomorrow, maybe."  
  
"Then we'll only have nine days," Bellamy says. "Nine days to get a secret out of a dragon, escape from her lair, get to the cure, and come back."  
  
"I did tell you we might not come home alive," Clarke says, and her hand curls around his. She's astoundingly warm, as always, a sorcerer's heat pulsing through her fingertips, and Bellamy squeezes back tightly. "Come on. Let's prepare something for Lexa."

In the end, it's Bellamy who comes up with the idea for a play after they find a wardrobe full of extravagant costumes. Many are bloodstained and ridden with holes, but you can't be too picky in a dragon's lair.

"Remember when you organized that play for the Prince's twelfth birthday?" Bellamy asks, laughing as Clarke holds up a brilliant blue gown up to her shoulders and dramatically flutters her eyelashes at him. "The King said it was a waste of time, but the Prince wanted one so badly that you got all the servants to help? And he played Lincoln and you played the Ice Queen and conjured clouds of glitter whenever there was a scene change?"

"We were washing glitter out of the great hall for weeks," Clarke remembers, a faraway look in her eyes. "I didn't think you remembered that. You were so young then."  
  
Her eyes focus on him, and Bellamy's laughter catches in his throat, because Clarke Griffin is looking at him a little bit like she wants him.

"I'm not so young now," he dares to say.  
  
"No," she replies, voice soft. "You're not."  
  
For a moment they still stare, taking each other in, and Bellamy steps forward. He doesn't really have a plan, doesn't know if he just wants to be closer or if he wants to try kissing her, but he steps forward all the same, and she takes half a step towards him - and then her face shuts down and she turns away.  
  
"See if you can find a suit of armour that fits you," she says. "You can play Lincoln. I'll be the Ice Queen again."  
  
For the rest of the day, all they speak about is the play. Bellamy has heard the tale of Lincoln meeting the Ice Queen hundreds of times over - Lincoln was Octavia's favourite hero, and she always asked for his stories, specifically. But Clarke is a little rustier on the dialogue, having filled her head with magic incantations rather than old legends, and she keeps forgetting her lines and stomping around the lair in frustration.

Night falls - or rather, they stop seeing cracks of light around the edges of the border, and Lexa still hasn't returned. Bellamy makes a bed out of a pile of robes that don't smell quite as ancient as the others, and lies down, staring at the ceiling of the cave.

"Bellamy?" Clarke asks tentatively.  
  
"Yes?"  
  
For a moment, she doesn't continue, and Bellamy thinks he might have just dreamed her calling his name. His eyes close, and he's about to drift off to sleep despite everything.

"Can I join you?"  
  
"Yes," he says, the word a little slurred with exhaustion, and he shifts in his pile of robes to make room for her. If he were more awake about it, he'd be embarrassed, but instead he just buries his face in the crook of her neck and lets his breathing out as Clarke hums another one of her lullabies.  
  
"You're very warm," he murmurs, just before he falls asleep. With one lazy hand he reaches up and trails his fingertip just underneath her collarbone. "Right here."

"That's my sorcerer's flame," Clarke says, her voice breathy, and Bellamy dreams of melting in a pool of warm heat.

The next morning, when they look through the spyglass, Octavia hasn't woken up. Bellamy checks throughout the rest of the day, distraught, but she never opens her eyes. Prince Wells sits in his bed and stares silently out the window. A servant comes in to put fresh flowers in a vase at Octavia's bedside, and Bellamy nearly hurls the spyglass away from him.

Nine days. Their countdown begins now.

  
_So rise up, Arkadia!_  
_Be worthy, Arkadia,_  
_Of your hero's return._

 

  
Lexa doesn't return for another three days. In that time, Bellamy pours his energy into thinking of schemes that will trick Lexa into telling them the secret of the cure. Clarke repurposes various items around the lair into props and a set for their play. They spend their nights curled up in Bellamy's pile of robes, and don't talk about it in the morning.

In that time, Prince Wells also slips into the deep sleep. Clarke won't look at Bellamy after they find out, but he hears her sniffling as she paints him a pretend shield.

"He's my best friend, you know," she says after several agonizing hours of silence. "When I left for the academy, he made me promise to write letters. I didn't think he'd really keep up with them, because he was just a kid then, but we wrote back and forth every week. I watched him grow up. And now I might have to watch him die."  
  
"We have six days," Bellamy says stubbornly. The muscle in his jaw that always jumps when he gets mad twitches.  
  
"Six days is so little to a sorcerer," Clarke says. She abruptly stops painting, sitting back on her heels and glaring at all the set designs she's painted so far. "If Lexa doesn't return tonight, I'm going to fly us back to the castle. The least we could do... The least we could do is be there for their last few days."  
  
Bellamy sits down next to her and pulls her into an embrace, because he doesn't know what else to say.

But as fate would have it, Lexa arrives that very evening. She warns them to step back from the boulder, blowing hot flames at it that lick at the edges of the opening and make Bellamy and Clarke shrink away behind a pile of treasure. When she's satisfied that they're not going to immediately try to escape, Lexa pushes it aside and strides into her lair, folding her wings along her back and regarding them with those bright, cruel eyes.

"Well?" she demands expectantly. "How will you entertain me tonight?"  
  
Clarke eyes Bellamy, and he nods.  
  
"We thought we might put on a play for you," he says, speaking with forced confidence so his voice echoes off the high ceilings of the cavern. "With costumes from your hoard. Clarke's even painted some props, since that's more interesting than just listening to the story."  
  
"I'll be the judge of that," Lexa says primly, and so he and Clarke dress in their costumes quickly and take up their positions. Their eyes meet, and she gives him a slow, steady smile that pours over him like warm honey, giving him strength and energy. Bellamy has no time to wonder if that's magic, or just Clarke, before they launch into their lines.  
  
Only a few lines in, Lexa realizes what tale they're putting on, and leaps to her feet, roaring with rage. Clarke stops mid-sentence and runs at Bellamy, pushing him behind a pile of treasure just as Lexa blows a wave of searing flame where they were just standing.

"You dare to come into my home and tell me a tale of the traitor Lincoln? Do you not know what the Ice Queen asked of him?"  
  
"What did we do wrong?" Bellamy hisses frantically.

"I don't understand," Clarke says back, her eyebrows furrowed together. And then louder, so Lexa can hear, "Lexa, please! What's wrong?"

After an agonizing minute, Lexa stops wildly blowing fire and commands them to come out where she can see them. Clarke hesitates a moment before quietly casting a spell that leaves Bellamy feeling like he's been drenched in ice water. He can only presume it'll provide some protection against Lexa's flames.

"To mortals, Lincoln is a great hero, is he not?" Lexa sneers. Her claws dig vicious gouges into the stone, making Bellamy wince. "Not to us dragons. He is a traitor! Do you know why he was so big and strong? Because he was raised by dragons, and dragons do not coddle their young. My kin Indra raised him as her own, and in thanks, he allied himself with the Ice Queen. It was she who commanded him to challenge Costia. And she died at his hands!"  
  
"The tale of Costia," Bellamy murmurs to himself, remembering that legend.  
  
"She was my lover," Lexa continues mournfully, as though she hadn't heard him. "And he killed her! It was the worst betrayal my kin have ever felt."  
  
"We're very sorry, Lexa," Clarke says seriously. "We didn't know a play about Lincoln and the Ice Queen would anger you."  
  
Lexa's throat glows orange-fold with fire, and for a moment Bellamy thinks she'll set them on fire right then and there, but eventually the glow fades and Lexa only lowers her head sadly.  
  
"It is strange," she muses. "To think that you sought me out for a cure to the Gray Death, only to remind me of its origins."  
  
"Its origins?" Bellamy questions. It's the first time Lexa has spoken of the Gray Death at all, beyond dismissing their initial pleas that she tell them what she knows of the cure.  
  
"Yes, its origins. Lincoln may have cut off my Costia's head on the Ice Queen's orders," Lexa says grimly. "But she had the last laugh, after all. With her dying breath she breathed out a plague to fall on Arkadia and it remains to this day to remind you not to cross a dragon."  
  
Bellamy and Clarke exchange wide-eyed glances. The Gray Death's origins have always been shrouded in mystery, having seemingly sprung into existence one day from nothing. But if the Gray Death _came_ from a dragon... then they must know a cure. Why else would the spectre have pointed them here?  
  
"Lexa, if you please," Clarke urges, stepping forward with a confidence born of having nothing left to lose. "Is there a cure for it? Do you know it?"  
  
"What does it matter?" Lexa asks, fixing Clarke with her cat-like eyes. "You will die in this cave, Clarke of Arkadia. You will never live to take your friends to it."  
  
"Then tell us anyway!" Bellamy blurts out. "Even if we'll never get to it, just tell us what it is!"  
  
"I am a dragon," Lexa says, turning away from them and striding towards the entrance. "I do what I want. And what I want now is to go flying. You have made me upset. If you do not improve your company when I return, I will eat you both tonight."  
  
The crash of the boulder punctuates the end of her sentence, leaving Clarke and Bellamy in stunned silence.

"She knows," Bellamy says, just as Clarke says, "I have an idea."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Do the legends describe Costia's appearance?" Clarke asks as she starts undressing out of the gown she'd chosen for the Ice Queen's costume right in front of him. Bellamy abruptly forgets all the legends he's ever heard as she's left in a simple tunic and breeches. "Bellamy?"

"Yes!" he says quickly, looking away. "They say she was small for a dragon, but quick and clever, with silver eyes and..."

As he talks, Clarke picks up a paintbrush and starts sketching on one of the mostly-intact sets. They don't have a lot to go on, since the legends preferred to wax poetic about Costia's teeth and claws rather than the colour of her scales or the shape of her wings, but after a few hours Clarke's got a pretty decent sketch of what she might have looked like.

"Do you think it'll be enough?" Clarke asks, stepping back to admire her handiwork. She's painted Costia curled around a pile of treasure, cat-like and almost... soft. The way Lexa must remember her. Not the way Arkadia tends to depict dragons.  
  
"If it isn't, I don't know what would be," Bellamy says, slinging a comforting arm around her shoulders. Clarke immediately turns into him, winding her arms around his waist and pressing her nose into the curve of his throat. Bellamy's breath stutters at the sudden warmth.  
  
"Bellamy," Clarke begins hesitantly. "I need to - "  
  
The heavy beat of wings from outside the cave makes them spring apart, though Bellamy has no idea why he feels like he's been caught doing something naughty. They wait with bated breath as Lexa rolls the boulder away and crawls back into the cave. Behind her, the night sky is blazing with distant stars. Their sixth day has come to an end. Octavia has five days left, and tonight Lexa will decide if Bellamy and Clarke live to the next morning.

"How was your flight?" Clarke asks.  
  
"Good," Lexa responds shortly. "I have decided that I will probably not kill you tonight. But of course, my final decision depends on your next moments. Tread carefully."  
  
Will a portrait of her dead lover send Lexa to the edge? Or be the very thing that saves them? Bellamy holds his breath as he and Clarke step aside and let her see the sketch. As soon as Lexa catches sight of it, she goes very still and her eyes go very wide. It's almost... vulnerable.

"It's just a sketch right now," Clarke says hurriedly. "But if you tell me a little more about what she looked like, I can improve it. So you'll always remember her."

"This pleases me. You have done well," Lexa says shortly, and then she stomps away to a far pile of treasure and goes to sleep without further conversation. Clarke sags against Bellamy's side.  
  
"That was more stressful than presenting my thesis at the academy," she mutters.  
  
"Understandable," Bellamy says. "The other sorcerers probably weren't going to eat you if they didn't like it."

"Time for bed?" Clarke asks. He lets her lead him to their pile of robes, even though she never sleeps, and they curl together with familiarity now, Clarke's head on his shoulder, one of his hands absently stroking her blonde hair.  
  
"What are you thinking?" Bellamy asks, in the quiet of night. Clarke sighs, takes her time answering.

"That I'm glad you followed me on this quest," she says, and he falls asleep smiling.

 

  
_Step follows step._  
_Hope follows courage._  
_Set your face toward danger._  
_Set your heart on victory._

 

  
It takes two days for Clarke to finish the painting of Costia to Lexa's satisfaction.  
  
Bellamy feels like they've been waiting for the moment for so long that when it finally comes, it's so unexpectedly... quiet.

Clarke just steps back from her makeshift canvas, brushing a lock of hair out of her eyes with the back of her hand and smearing silvery paint all over her forehead, and Bellamy watches her eyes dart over the painting. He's found that he likes watching her work, if only for the way she becomes utterly entranced in what she does, pouring her soul into it.

"It's done," Clarke says out loud, and from her perch atop a pile of silver jewelry, Lexa uncurls and blinks away sleep. She strides to Clarke's side with only a few steps and lowers her head to come to eye-level with the painting. Bellamy holds his breath.  
  
Several agonizing moments pass, and Lexa still continues to gaze upon the portrait. She blows a tiny wisp of smoke, very slowly, and Bellamy tenses up even more, wishing he had Banshee at his hip for all the good it would do him against a dragon.

"My Costia," Lexa murmurs at last, lost in thought. Then she shakes herself, nearly knocking Clarke over, and seems to gain new strength. "You have done well, Clarke of Arkadia. In return, I will tell you what you wanted to know so badly. I will tell you about the cure of the Gray Death."  
  
He and Clarke exchange stunned glances, then quickly turn their attention back to Lexa.

"So there's a cure after all?" Bellamy says.  
  
"Of course there is," Lexa answers shortly. "Costia was too kind for her own good. Bring out your maps, Bellamy of Arkadia. It is no match for seeing the world through a dragon's eyes, but it will do for now."  
  
They nearly tear their maps in their haste to unfold them in front of Lexa.

"What is this?" she grumbles, twisting her neck around and glaring at the spread maps with one eye. "This is tiny. These lines were drawn by mice. Where is the village of TonDC?"

Clarke finds it first, having seen much more of the world than Bellamy, and all three of them focus their attention on the tiny dot at which her finger points. Bellamy wonders if it is pure coincidence that TonDC - such a small, insignificant spot on the map - also happens to be the village where Lincoln was last seen, before the legends say he walked into a mist never to be seen again.  
  
"There is a valley near TonDC in which a waterfall descends from the sky," Lexa says, her voice rumbling at such close quarters. "I do not mean that it comes from a high, unseen mountain peek. I mean it really does descend from the sky, from the lost mountain of fairies. Pesky things, those fairies. Too fond of music, it grates on my ears. I suspect they do it on purpose, so dragons avoid their enchanted mountain."  
  
"And the cure, the fairies have it?" Clarke urges.  
  
"The cure is a drink from that waterfall," Lexa answers. "That water falls nowhere else in Arkadia, and disappears as soon as it touches the ground. You could not put it in a flask and take that to your loved ones, because it would vanish the moment you took a step. Only that waterfall will do, and only there. And now, because I have told you, I will kill you."  
  
"Thank you for your hospitality," Clarke says, her voice shaking, and then she reaches for Bellamy. He sees in her eyes that she plans to move then, and perhaps Lexa must see it too, because all of a sudden she roars with fury and blows a vicious wave of fire their way. Clarke wrenches Bellamy out of the way just in time, and the maps go up in flames.

"Close your eyes and hold on to me," Clarke says to Bellamy, and he has just enough time to hide his face in her hair before a terrible, blinding light flashes white behind his eyelids, and he has the oddest sensation of moving. Lexa's roar is still echoing in his ears, and everything burns hot, and then as suddenly as the pressure had started, it is gone.  
  
Bellamy blinks at a pale blue sky.  
  
It takes him a moment to sit up, wincing, his whole body sore. There is soft green grass underneath his fingers, the young shoots of spring. Birds are chirping somewhere nearby. It is a beautiful day, the kind Octavia would love.  
  
_Octavia!_

He suddenly remembers, and scrambles to his feet.

"Clarke!" he calls out, and promptly falls over again, struck by a bout of dizziness. "Clarke!" The second time he stands, he manages to stay upright long enough to spot his companion lying face-down in the grass several steps away. He stumbles to her side and collapses to his knees, fearing the worst at the sight of her sprawled, motionless limbs. "Clarke," he says again, softly, like a prayer, as he turns her onto her back.

She opens her eyes.

"Bellamy," she murmurs, and he could cry with relief. He bends over and presses a rough kiss to her cheek, overwhelmed by emotion.  
  
"We did it," he whispers, stroking her hair reverently. She still seems dazed, and he hopes she recovers soon because they have to get back to Octavia and Wells. "We found a cure."  
  
"Not yet," Clarke says, struggling to sit up. "We still have to get back to the castle, and then all the way to TonDC with them. And I burned up all my magic getting us away from Lexa.  
  
"We can do that," Bellamy promises. "We can do anything."  
  
Clarke blinks at him, her eyes wide and still so mesmerizingly blue.  
  
"Yes," she says, a slow smile cracking her lips. "Yes, I think we just might."  
  
Without Clarke's magic or Bellamy's horses, the journey is slow. Like in the forest, they hold hands for the majority over it, helping each other up rocky outcroppings and over bubbling streams. There is no excuse of an invisible cloak this time, but Clarke's grip is steady in Bellamy's.

He learns more about her, in tidbits of conversation. They do not speak much - not for lack of things to say, of course, but from an understanding that getting back to the castle quickly is what matters more, and that there will be a time to get to know each other's secrets later. When they do speak, it's comfortable, easy in a way Bellamy never thought was possible.

It takes them two days of continuous walking to reach the castle, dodging gryphons and ogres and ghosts along the way. By the time the parapets come into view, flying King Jaha's distinctive black horse banner, Bellamy could fall to his knees and cry, but he doesn't.

Because if his calculations are correct, Octavia only has a day left to live, and Prince Wells only a little while longer. They've made it back, but only in the nick of time.

"Wait," Clarke says, holding Bellamy back when he makes to keep walking down the road to the drawbridge.  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"I'm worried King Jaha and my mother won't let Wells leave the castle, if they knew," Clarke says, biting her lip.  
  
"They can't do that," Bellamy exclaims in horror. "They couldn't keep him from the cure!"  
  
"They're hardly going to believe that a dragon told us the truth," Clarke reasons. "To them, it's a fools hope. To us, it's only a little more."  
  
"Then what's the plan?"

Clarke grins, a mischievous smile that barely gives Bellamy enough warning before Clarke's conjured a wind to blow them both to the top of her sorcerer's tower. The window swings open as soon as they approach, and the wind deposits them safely inside in the same mess that was present when Bellamy ran after her, what seems like a lifetime ago.

"I feel like I've aged years since I've been here," Clarke murmurs, glancing around her tower.  
  
"It's been a lively trip," Bellamy agrees. Clarke _hmphs_ and pulls out a rolled-up rug from the corner of her room and marches out of the door with it in her arms. He follows, more than a little confused.  
  
He's not entirely prepared for the rush of emotion that hits him when they turn the corner and the door to the infirmary comes into view. Bellamy's steps speed up involuntarily, wanting to see his sister for himself. They've been using the spyglass to check in as they walked towards the castle, but... It's not the same. He hears her voice just before he opens the door, and his heart squeezes painfully. Was she losing hope? Did she think he'd left forever?

Octavia is perched on the edge of Prince Wells' cot, just underneath the windowsills, and she is telling him a story Bellamy knows well, because he's told it to her so many times. The legend of Arkadia's greatest hero, Lincoln. Of course she'd manage to win the prince's friendship. There's no one in the land who could resist Octavia's charms.

Bellamy sees the moment she registers his presence, because her story abruptly stops, and her face shines with joy and disbelief.  
  
"Bell!" she cries out, standing up and rushing towards him. When he hugs her she is nearly as warm as Clarke, and Bellamy knows it's the fever, knows it's killing her, but he's so relieved that he's come back to find her still alive. There's still hope.

When he pulls away at last, it's to see Clarke and Prince Wells having a similar reunion.

"Did you really find a cure?" Octavia asks, looking between the two of them intently.  
  
"We did," Bellamy says. "From a dragon. We'll tell you the story on the way, but we have to leave right now."  
  
"Leave?" Prince Wells asks, raising his eyebrows. His voice is as hoarse and tired as Octavia's, another reminder that time is running out.  
  
"Just trust me," Clarke says, and with that, she rolls out the carpet she took from her tower. It seems to shudder on the floor, and Bellamy steps back, alarmed, before it raises itself a hands breath from the stone and floats, perfectly horizontal.  
  
"A flying carpet?" Octavia asks, delighted.  
  
"It's the best way to travel," Clarke answers, beaming. "Now hop on before my mother sees us!"  
  
It turns out to be a valid warning. No sooner than they manage to squeeze onto the carpet, arranging stray limbs and blankets to keep the feverish passengers warm, than the infirmary door swings open and Abby steps in. She pauses mid-step in the doorway, mouth open in a perfect, alarmed circle, before Clarke points at the window and not only bursts open but grows in size, until it's large enough for them to shoot through, screaming.

Behind them, Abby leans out the window as far as she dares and yells at their receding backs. The wind steals her words, but it's not hard to guess what she's saying.

 

 

 _TonDC left behind -_  
_Lincoln, the saviour,_  
_Faced down the sun_  
_Reflected in his shield,_  
_The moon in his silver sword Banshee,_  
_The drum in his heart._  
_Faced down his someday death_  
_Glimpsed from afar._  
_Lincoln, the saviour,_  
_Tall among men._

 

  
TonDC is not much in the darkness - though Bellamy suspects it wouldn't be any more impressive in the morning light. The magic carpet slows as the village wall, felled trees lined up, their sharpened points towards the sky, comes into view.

"This is it," Prince Wells comments quietly. It's worrying to see just how exhausted he's become by the hours spent on their journey, but Octavia's state is even more worrying. Bellamy looks down at his little sister, curled up in the middle of the carpet, her head resting in his lap. In sleep she almost looks peaceful, fever-flushed lips parted slightly, hair splayed over his robes. He's had his hand resting on her neck ever since she fell asleep. Every time her heartbeat slows, the icy spike of fear that's been in his chest since she collapsed seems to drive itself deeper into his heart.  
  
They're so close. She has to make it. She has to.

"I'll talk to the villagers," Clarke says, nimbly leaping off the flying carpet before it's slowed to a stop at the gates of TonDC. Her blonde hair shines like a beacon in the moonlight as she floats down over the village wall. There are shouts to greet her, but they don't sound too hostile. Just surprised.

Bellamy looks back to Octavia. They're almost there.

"Clarke likes you," Prince Wells says. It takes Bellamy a moment to realize he's speaking to him - though there's no one else nearby awake.  
  
"What?" Bellamy deadpans. It is most definitely not the appropriate way to address his future monarch, but Bellamy thinks he should be allowed a little leeway for his participation in this quest. Also, he hasn't had a lot of sleep lately.  
  
"She doesn't warm to a lot of people," Prince Wells says. His voice is serious, and still regal despite its hoarseness. "If this doesn't work - "  
  
"It has to work," Bellamy interrupts. His hand twitches on Octavia's neck, fingers pressed against her pulse, and she stirs ever so slightly before lapsing back into weary sleep.  
  
"If it doesn't work," Prince Wells repeats, dark eyes boring into Bellamy's. "Then you have to take care of her for me. Everyone else sees her as the invincible sorcerer, but to us she's just Clarke."  
  
Bellamy doesn't answer, but he thinks the prince gets him. And by that point, the gates of TonDC have just creaked open, just enough for Clarke and one other person to return to the carpet.  
  
"I found a guide to take us to the falls," Clarke announces, once they're in range. The figure at her side is shrouded in a travelling cloak that hides their face but not their limp. Bellamy raises his eyebrows as the mysterious guide finally reaches them and pushes back their hood from their face. His first thought is that she is strikingly beautiful, his second that this is not a person to be crossed. The guide's dark eyes flash over each of them in turn, resting the longest upon Octavia.  
  
"My name is Raven Reyes," she says at last, bowing her head ever so slightly to Prince Wells, who looks more than a little shell shocked by her presence. "I'm here to take you to the waterfall."

Raven proves to have keener eyesight than most, and an even sharper tongue. She sits at the front of the carpet with Prince Wells, pointing out various landmarks in the darkness as they flash by and are left behind forever. Clarke perches in the center, on the balls of her feet like she's watching for danger, and Bellamy takes up the back with Octavia.

"We're almost there," Raven says at last, and Bellamy shakes Octavia awake though he's loathe to disturb her. He swallows down the hard lump in his throat as her eyes blink open, pale and colourless by moonlight.  
  
"Bell?" she murmurs, dazed.  
  
"Wake up, sleepyhead," Bellamy says, forcing a smile and stroking her hair away from her face. "You're about to be the first person to ever be cured of the Gray Death."  
  
A few weeks ago Octavia would have crowed and jumped for joy at that, and now she manages only a weak smile and a rattling exhale. He has to help her sit up, because she's too weak to do it on her own.

"I can't believe it," Clarke murmurs, just as the mists in front of them part, and up ahead they see what must be the waterfall - it falls too perfectly to be mistaken for any ordinary rush of water, tumbling without the disruption of stone or debris, simply as though someone is pouring out a never-emptying bucket of water from the heavens above. "It's really - "  
  
Her next words are drowned out by a roar that shakes Bellamy's very bones, and fills him with a too-familiar dread. Lexa's shadow passes right over her heads, and the violent gusts of air she leaves in her wake on the downbeats of her wings send the magic carpet tumbling head over heels. Bellamy hears screams as the carpet flips over and they're all thrown in different directions, but he has no time to check for the others. Somehow he manages to keep holding Octavia's hand through it all, and as they fall through the air he pulls her closer and holds on tight, thinking that if they're going to hit the ground, they should hit it together.

"O," he sobs, her name stolen by the howl of wind as the ground rushes up.  
  
And then, just before they reach it, they hit what feels like the softest and gentlest of embraces. Bellamy stares at the ground, inches from his face, and starts laughing hysterically.

"Get it together, big brother," Octavia says, and so he picks her up on his back and settles his feet on firm ground.  
  
"Thank you, Clarke," he whispers. The others must be scattered in the meadow somewhere nearby, but Bellamy will worry about them in a moment. He has to get Octavia to the waterfall.  
  
But at the first step he takes on solid soil, it starts to bubble under his feet, and he scrambles backwards in alarm as a large curve bursts out of the grass - and just keeps _growing._ His mouth drops in horror as he realizes what he thought was a giant boulder turns out instead to be the head of an _ogre._

"Run!" Clarke cries out, swooping down from above and striking the ogre right in the eye with a ball of lightning. Bellamy doesn't think before he braces Octavia against his back with one hand and pulls Banshee out with the other, even as he's darting past the ogre's flailing limbs. It screams with fury as its great muddy hands find only empty air, aim ruined by Clarke's magic.  
  
Banshee turns out to be a good idea, because more and more ogres are growing out of the ground. High overhead, Lexa is shrieking bloody murder and setting the meadow aflame all around them, and Bellamy has a inkling that somehow, she's waking the ogres up on purpose.

They're halfway to the waterfall when a dozen other shrieks join Lexa's. Bellamy dares to look up just long enough to see a swarm of gryphons descending.

"Clarke!" he yells out. He hears her voice in response, but can't place it in the chaos. "Gryphons! The tablecloth!"  
  
"Bell," Octavia whispers desperately in his ear. "Bell, I don't think I have much time left. I can't feel my legs."  
  
"It's going to be okay," Bellamy pants. "We're almost there."

He hitches his sister higher up on his back and hands her Banshee to hold on to, knowing it'll give her strength. Up ahead, two staggering silhouettes that must be Prince Wells and Raven are nearly at the waterfall.

"Anything comes near us, you stab it," he pants. "You know what this is?"  
  
"Banshee," Octavia says reverently. "This is Lincoln's sword from the legends!"  
  
"That's right," Bellamy says, and ducks to avoid the swing of a vicious ogre club. He doesn't quite manage it, because the blow strikes him in the side and sends them sprawling. He sees stars, and forces himself to stand up anyway, because Octavia needs him.  
  
Lexa lands between them and the waterfall with an earth-shattering roar, and Bellamy once again falls to his knees as everything shakes.

"Bellamy of Arkadia," Lexa sneers, crawling towards him with snapping jaws. "So this is the sister you betrayed my hospitality for? She's a lively one, even now. I can almost see why you did it. But I do not forgive treachery."  
  
"Leave him alone!" Octavia cries, staggering to her feet and putting herself between Lexa and Bellamy. She raises Banshee high up above her head with two shaking hands, and it might be just the light but Bellamy could swear he sees something reflected in the shining blade, something that is old and powerful and not from a meadow that is going up in flames and crawling with ogres. "In the name of Lincoln, the hero, I command you to leave us alone!"  
  
And a sound like the sweetest of music notes whispers through the air, emanating from Banshee, somehow heard over the cawing of gryphons as they tear into the magical tablecloth, over the crash and thuds of ogres battling each other in confusion after Clarke's blinded them, over a distant rumbling in the sky high above that almost sounds like a storm. The music grows louder and louder, and it is the most beautiful thing Bellamy has ever heard, and he feels a tear roll down his cheek. Octavia is still standing, wavering, between him and Lexa, her arms shaking violently with the effort of holding Banshee up, but she doesn't lower it.

What sounds like peace to Bellamy must sound like something very different to Lexa, because as soon as Banshee starts glowing in Octavia's hands she shrinks in on herself, roaring and scratching at her ears with wicked claws.

"Stop it!" Lexa cries out. "Stop it now, or I will burn you to a crisp!"  
  
And when Octavia makes no move to lower Banshee, Lexa's throat glows golden-hot. Bellamy knows too well the heat of her flames, and the fierce determination in her dragon green eyes shakes him out of the stunned reverie the music has put him into.

"Octavia!" Bellamy cries. _"Octavia!"_  
  
He never makes it to her. Something like a wave of white light crashes over him, drenching Octavia in something so brilliantly bright that he can't look at her. It's the moment Clarke took them from Lexa's lair, but ten thousand times better and worse.

Bellamy finds himself on his back in the grass, tasting smoke on his tongue and looking at a sky heavy with dark rainclouds. He can't move anything, can't even breathe for a moment.

Clarke appears out of nowhere, dropping to her knees at his side and leaning over him.

"Bellamy," she says, hands cradling his cheeks and turning his head towards her. "Oh, gods, don't be dead. Please. Bellamy, I love you."  
  
She kisses him then, like cool water, and it's the most unfair thing in the world, because Bellamy can't even breathe, much less raises his arms and hold her to him. When she pulls away, he blinks, long and slow, and pulls a rattling breath into his chest.

"Octavia," he croaks. "We - no more time."  
  
Clarke is crying. He thinks he might be too.  
  
"Don't you see?" Clarke says, smiling weakly at him. "It's raining, Bellamy. _The cure for the Gray Death will come when rain falls over all of Arkadia_. Octavia did it. She was the true hero of Arkadia, and she's made it rain."

Heavy splotches of water fall onto Bellamy's face, catching on his eyelashes, relieving the pain of his heat-cracked lips. It really is raining. Realization comes slow.  
  
"Was?" he asks, voice choking. " _Was_ the true hero?"  
  
"Oh, Bellamy," Clarke says, her face collapsing, and then everything goes dark and he knows no more.

 

  
........................................................................................................................

 

  
He opens his eyes to light.

There is an unmoving pressure on his chest, and Bellamy takes a moment to remember how to move his neck to look at it.

A dark head, the curve of it so familiar.

"Octavia?" he asks disbelievingly. She sits up, and the lines of his tunic are imprinted on her cheek. How long as she been asleep at his side? Her eyes sharpen at once, mouth dropping open with delight. Her face is full of colour again, not the flush of the Gray Death's fever, but the colour she had when she was healthy. Or... something similar to it.  
  
Something is different, but when Bellamy tries to look straight at it, the detail dances out of focus, slipping to the corners of his vision where he can only guess at what it is. Her hair is clean and fluffy, and braided away from her face in more complicated knots than he has ever seen. Her robes, too, are rich and fine, not weighed down with cumbersome jewelry or such but somehow radiating a bizarre mix of wilderness and elegance.  
  
"You're awake!" she cries out, and leaps up to kiss his forehead. "Gods, Bell, do you know how long we've been waiting for you? Clarke's been going out of her _mind."_  
  
"Clarke," Bellamy says. Nothing makes sense. He furrows his eyebrows. "She said you... She said you died. What did I miss? Where are we?"  
  
Octavia gets a strange look in her eyes, something akin to pity. He doesn't understand.

"Prince Wells got to the waterfall in time," she begins, winding their fingers together and squeezing tightly. "You'll be pleased to hear that he's been cured of the Gray Death, and he seems pretty taken with Raven. They've been arguing about the best way to improve trade in Arkadia since we got here. I think it's their way of flirting?"  
  
"And you?" Bellamy forces himself to ask. Octavia's dancing around the answer, and he doesn't understand why.  
  
"After I held up Banshee..." Octavia says, and then trails off, biting her lip. He's never seen her at a loss for words before. "Clarke says Lincoln's sword recognized me as a kindred spirit. All those legends about Banshee having the power to ward off evil in the hands of a hero were apparently true, because after the music ended and the light faded, Lexa and all the ogres and gryphons and monsters were just... _gone._ I think I vanquished them somehow, because they haven't been seen since. And then it started raining, and the fairies say it fell all over Arkadia, just like the spectre prophesied it would. Bell, we cured the _entire land_ of the Gray Death."  
  
Bellamy gapes at her for a moment.

"Fairies?" he questions. There's a knock on the door.  
  
"They're real, Bell. We're at their palace on the invisible mountain, right now. It'll be easier if you see," she says, and then she leaves for a moment to answer the door. Bellamy struggles to sit up, and finally takes in the decor of the room around him. Years later when asked to describe it, he will shake his head and say only that it was a place of great inner peace.

Octavia returns with the tallest man Bellamy has ever seen, a man with darker skin than his and dark, intense eyes with the greatest depth of kindness. They're holding hands, and standing next to each other, they're almost too beautiful to look at.

"Bellamy," Octavia says, almost nervous. "This is Lincoln."  
  
"You can't be," Bellamy says automatically. "You lived hundred of years ago. You were human, and then you vanished into the mountains beyond TonDC."  
  
"All true statements," the man who cannot be Lincoln says. His voice is like a slow-moving river, steady and powerful. "When I learned that I had unleashed what you call the Gray Death upon Arkadia, I made it my mission to seek out the fairies and return with a cure. I was dying when they found me, and to save my life, they made me one of them. But I was not the one meant to save Arkadia. That honour belongs to Octavia."  
  
He turns to smile at Octavia as he says her name, his whole face melting with a quiet joy and adoration, and Octavia returns the expression with her usual brilliant intensity. Bellamy's head spins. Just how long as he been asleep?

"I don't..." he begins. "How..."  
  
And then, looking between Lincoln and Octavia, Bellamy understands.

"O," he says, his voice cracking. "O, you're a fairy now?"  
  
Octavia lets go of Lincoln's hand and throws herself into his arms, embracing him tightly.

"I'm sorry, Bellamy. The rain cured everyone that it could, but some of us were just too close to death. The fairies made me an offer and I... I took it. I'm meant for greater things now, like battling evil and ridding Arkadia of all its monsters, and helping Wells build a better kingdom."  
  
He cries, of course. Lincoln takes his leave somewhere in the middle of Bellamy's swirling confusion, and Octavia cries too, both of them mourning the girl Octavia would have been, had she lived out a mortal life. Bellamy can't be angry, because he _understands._ He'll always understand. But he'll also always see the little girl she was, the sister he promised to protect. He failed. Octavia must know where his thoughts go, because she grasps him by the cheeks and looks into his eyes sternly.

"You did not fail me, Bellamy. You helped save the _entire_ kingdom."  
  
"But I didn't save you," he says.  
  
"I'm happy here," Octavia says, kissing his cheek. "If you won't let me convince you, can you at least let Clarke try?"  
  
And then she steps back, and Clarke is standing at the foot of his bed, fidgeting with the clasp of her cloak. Like Lincoln, Octavia vanishes without him noticing, leaving the two of them alone. Bellamy drinks the sight of her in and doesn't know what to say.

He remembers kissing her, desperately, her confession pouring out of her lips as she thought he was dying, but emotions run high on a battlefield. There's no telling if some time to think has left her with the same sentiments.

"Hey Clarke," he tries.  
  
"It took you long enough to wake up," she says in return, and some of the ice between them starts cracking because she walks around the edge of the bed and sits at his side. Her hand twitches in her lap. On impulse, he reaches out and takes it.  
  
"Sorry to keep you waiting."  
  
Her eyes dart to his, and to his lips, and back to their joined hands.

"Bellamy," she begins. "I don't know if you remember, but - "  
  
"I remember," he says. He doesn't want to let himself hope, but he can't tear his gaze away from her face, away from the lightning-fast emotions that flicker over it.  
  
"And?"  
  
Her voice is hardly above a breath.

"And I think you'd better come here and kiss me again," Bellamy says. "Because I promise I can definitely do a better job now that I'm not dying."  
  
Clarke laughs, and then she's leaning over him, her blonde hair tickling his face as she comes close and presses her lips against his. How could he ever have thought she was made of ice? Clarke is a drink of cool water.  
  
After at last she breaks away to let him breathe, he looks at her pensively, stroking a thumb over her knuckles.

"Is this the happily ever after?" he asks, half seriously and half in jest.  
  
"Gods no," Clarke says with a laugh. "First we have to get everyone home, let my mother and the King drag us for kidnapping the prince on a flying carpet, explain that fairies are real and your sister just became one, and there will probably be some kind of celebration for us once we're forgiven, because we are, after all, kind of heroes."  
  
"We could ditch the celebration," Bellamy suggests. "And travel the kingdom fighting monsters and not listening to anyone."  
  
"You know," Clarke says, blue eyes bright with mirth. "That's not a terrible idea."  
  
"And then we live happily ever after?"  
  
She presses another kiss to his mouth, and he can feel himself smiling against her lips until she ends up kissing teeth.

"And then we live happily ever after."

 

  
  
(And they did.)

 

**Author's Note:**

> *screams forever*  
> I wrote this in 3 days instead of studying for exams, I am out of control. I never write that quickly. Bless you, deadlines.  
> The Two Princesses of Bamarre was one of my absolute favourite books as a child and when I heard my lovely secret santa was fond of magic + aus, I thought, well, let's go for it! Didn't expect to end up with nearly 20k. I'm so sorry. I really hope you liked it, all the same! I would have liked to include more Raven since you said you like her, but I was worried that I wouldn't finish the fic in time and so I had to cut down some of the parts after she appeared. :(  
> The italicized "legends" were modified from the ones in the book, and the 'these lines were drawn by mice' line was also taken from the book because grumpy dragon Vollys was my fav. I modified some of the sorcerer lore from the book - in the book they really are born when lightning strikes marble, thus the title, but I wanted to include the rest of the Griffins.  
> As always, thank you for reading. And happy holidays, my friends.


End file.
